Editor’s note: This commentary is by Nick Clark, an at-large member of the Progressive Party’s Coordinating Committee, a Thetford Selectboard member, and a candidate for Vermont House in 2016 and 2018.
Climate change is an emergency that is affecting our property taxes. Singular, intense weather events such as Tropical Storm Irene and the July 2017 storm have obvious impacts on towns, but gradual changes to Vermont’s weather trends add up too.
Two trends of note are: 1. winters are generally becoming warmer, and 2. day-to-day winter temperatures are fluctuating more frequently and dramatically. Warmer winters mean that foliage season starts later each fall, impacting Vermont’s tourism industry, and Vermont roads are being posted earlier each spring, which constrains Vermont’s logging industry. Increasingly erratic day-to-day temperatures are putting a strain on road crews and municipal budgets (and therefore property taxes).
Winter warming above freezing (32°F) has several impacts. First, if the warmer weather is accompanied by precipitation, it can bring a mixture of snow, sleet and rain. Second, warmer weather facilitates snow melting, particularly of compacted snow banks along roads. Roads are dark in color and have a lot of thermal mass – both characteristics contribute to snow melting. Third, warmer temperatures facilitate ground thaw, which is accelerated near roads.
When temperatures drop below freezing at night, mixed precipitation and melted snow, impounded by roadside snow banks, can create icy and dangerous driving conditions, requiring municipal and state road crews to apply sand and/or salt. This is more expensive than merely plowing. Repeated thaw-freeze cycles can increase the size and number of frost heaves and decrease the longevity of our infrastructure. Snow melt or precipitation that finds its way into the resulting surface cracks and then refreezes can be particularly damaging.
Let’s narrow in on some specifics: In Vermont, according to the National Weather Service, there were 26 days in February 2019 where the high was 32 degrees or above and the low was below 32 degrees – in February 2018, there were only 16 of those days. That means there were 10 more days of potential thawing and freezing last February compared to the February before. Precipitation aside, these temperature swings alone dictate an increased need for sand and salt.
In Thetford, where I serve on the Selectboard, the town ordered $48,298.39 worth of sand and salt in February 2019, compared to $40,716.20 in February of 2018. Those 10 extra days of thawing and freezing arguably resulted in a roughly 20% increase in sand and salt expenses over the previous year. It’s worth noting that some sand and salt could have been on hand from January orders, or left unused in February but then used in March. Looking at the two winters in total then, Thetford spent roughly 27.8% more in the winter of 2018/19 ($201,911.02), where there were more days with dramatic temperature swings, than in 2017/18 ($157,997.49), where swings were fewer. Salt and sand costs for the winter of 2018/19 represented roughly one fifth of Thetford’s total public works budget.
Warmer winters and more dramatic and frequent temperature swings are compelling roads crews to use more sand and salt to keep us safe. Added to budget impacts there are other ramifications – the more sand and salt road crews apply, the more runoff and contamination there is of Vermont’s waterways and ecosystems.
Climate change is getting expensive. What is our plan to address it?
